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Throwback Thursday

Feb. 8, 2018

CNA file photo

Caption

Right, Nathan Lange and his mom Diane Osmun try to keep the sidewalk clear in front of their house on Adams Street as a winter storm moved into the area Feb. 6, 2008, and dumped another 8 inches of snow, closing schools and advice from emergency services for area residents to "stay home."

Today is Feb. 8, the 39th day of the year. So, there are 326 days left in 2018. Below are news items from the Creston News Advertiser for this week (Feb. 5-11) in history:

The Quiz Bowl, an online competition of questions covering many academic areas as well as sports and politics, was scored by the number of correct answers as well as the speed with which they were answered. Students in Mrs. Heinzel’s seventh-grade class placed second in the state out of 35 teams and received a trophy. They included Shaylen Kipp, Caleb Thompson, Austin Hurt, Kelsey Riley, Bryce McIlravy, Logan Angelo, Emily Lange, Jessica O’Riley, Adam Bochart, Travis Miller, Emma Johnson, Sydney Rogers and Katie Pudenz.

20 years ago

After 20 years as Adams County assessor, Richard Baliff was told to turn in his keys and vacate his office in the courthouse after a unanimous vote of the conference board in a special session. Baliff’s wife Darlene, deputy assessor for 18 years, was appointed acting assessor until a new assessor was appointed. Chairman Dan Morgan told that Baliff’s appointment Feb. 13, 1997, was not legal since the motion to reappoint him was made by Judy Beckett, Prescott city clerk. Since Beckett was not mayor or mayor pro tem, the motion was illegal. It was noted about the “interesting timing” of the issue as the Baliffs and the county had been in a dispute over the site of the original Icarian Colony for nearly three years, and the board planned to condemn the property owned by the Baliff’s after purchase negotiations were unsuccessful.

Rick Bird and Union County officials were to appear in court again, but this time Bird was not the defendant. Bird, serving a life sentence for first degree murder, had filed a complaint about conditions of the Union County Jail. He claimed his chronic airway lung disease was exacerbated by the lack of ventilation in his cell, combined with the vent for the clothes dryer blowing into his cell every night. The conditions allegedly caused shortness of breath and loss of sleep during his incarceration.

Approximately 50 students, parents and community supporters attended a board of directors meeting at SWCC asking the board to reverse its decision from May 1997 to discontinue the rodeo program after the end of that school year. President Barb Crittenden noted the decision to discontinue the rodeo program was based on cost and and liability concerns surpassing revenue possibilities from tuition and horse stall rentals.

50 years ago

Burlington railroad officials met with Mayor Frank Boortz and the Creston City Council to discuss the depot and Elm Street crossing. The railroad was proposing to give the depot and the land west of it to the city, if the proposal for an underpass to be built at the Elm street crossing was renewed.

The 1888 birthplace of Henry A. Wallace, the only Iowan who had served as vice president of the United States, was one of the historic sites in Iowa featured in a book written by William J. Wagner, a Des Moines architect. The birthplace is on a farm which had been occupied for the past 18 years by the Virgil Lundy family, who say the house had been changed very little from when the Wallace family lived there.